ISA: Our Information was Precise

ISA says it gave a focused and concrete warning about the terror attack in southern Israel, dismisses IDF claims.

By Elad Benari

First Publish: 8/19/2011, 12:37 AM

IDF officers following terror attack

Flash 90

Officials with the Israel Security Agency (ISA) expressed their surprise on Thursday at comments which were published in the name of senior IDF officers who said that a warning released prior to Thursday’s combined terror attack was not focused enough.

Earlier, IDF officials said that while there had been warnings of an impending terror attack, they were not focused as to the time and place of such an attack.

The ISA claimed, however, that it had given the IDF a targeted and precise warning of the planned attack.

“The ISA,” a security official told Arutz Sheva, “issued a warning about the planned attack in the exact region in which it was ultimately carried out. The warning included the exact plans for the attack.”

The official added that the quality of the ISA’s intelligence and its relevance in real-time could not have been better.

Other security sources added that the fact that additional IDF, police, and ISA forces were deployed in southern Israel on Wednesday was because of the information about the planned attack.

“If we did not think the warning was concrete, we would not have deployed extra forces,” a security official told Arutz Sheva. “After all, why would forces be deployed, yesterday afternoon, had there not been a concrete warning? The forces that were on the ground today were deployed yesterday following the ISA’s alert.”